While I’m undoubtedly an album guy, and all of my song picks the past few weeks have come from albums and artists I number among my favorites, here is at least one exception.
I like Dire Straits but I wouldn’t say I’m a Dire Straits fan. I own only two of their albums — Brothers In Arms and Making Movies — and I am drawn more to individual songs than the complete records.
I’ve enjoyed the past two weeks of favorite songs so much that I’m dedicating this week to some honorable mentions.
It’s pretty clear that there are hundreds of songs in the running and one batch could easily replace another depending on my mood. Here are five more that almost made the cut this time around.
I like when my Random Weekends produce a song that is new to me.
This one comes from the Hunger Games soundtrack, which I bought due to the presence of Pistol Annies, Neko Case, Arcade Fire, Maroon 5 and Taylor Swift. I think I listened to the whole thing through only once.
I don’t know who The Carolina Chocolate Drops are, but this is a nice enough track. It does a good job channeling the Appalachian dystopia of the book and film.
Here’s a lovely track from Bob Dylan’s Oh Mercy, the 1989 album that rescued him from his mid-80s slump.
Dylan followed Oh Mercy a year later with the uninspired and downright goofy Under the Red Sky and then it would be nine years before his late career renaissance kicked off with 1997’s Time Out of Mind.
A few years ago I counted down my list of favorite songwriters and Paul Simon wound up in the top spot. So it’s no surprise that he’d place a song on this list.
What may be a surprise is that I’m not going with one of his solo tracks, particularly something from Graceland, one of the best albums ever recorded.
Meet Me In Montauk 